Feedback

Organisations can use feedback to track how satisfied farmers are with how activities are implemented and what they are achieving. Carefully implemented, feedback systems generate quantified data, disaggregated by gender.

This is an emerging field. We want to learn with other organisations how to improve feedback systems and strengthen farmer voice as a resource for the sector. If you are working on farmer voice, please contact us and get involved!

Good practice principles

We have identified six key good practice principles for farmer feedback systems:

  1. Adapt systems to the context. Organisations should adapt approaches to fit their circumstances and the farmers they work with. This includes identifying: which specific groups of farmers organisations want to hear from; what data will be used (by whom); what data collection methods will be appropriate and cost effective; how systems fit with other priorities.
  2. Develop assessment criteria with farmers. One-off initial research should identify what farmers view as important about a programme and what they want to get out of it. Organisations should use this to identify indicators and specific criteria for assessing performance. This links to programme planning.
  3. Generate quantitative feedback data. Collect farmers' perceptions of performance on quantitative scales, using the pre-determined assessment criteria. Data collection methods should be matched to the context. They can vary from surveys to focus groups to direct feedback at the point of delivery. Data should be disaggregated by gender. New technology may reduce costs.
  4. Report and publish comparative data. Using quantitative data, performance can be compared between activities. Benchmarks can be identified and trends monitored. Findings should be reported back to farmers and to senior decision makers, including donors, in appropriate formats. We argue that findings should also be reported publically.
  5. Discuss findings together and identify actions. Findings should be discussed by decision-makers and farmers together. This may involve other stakeholders, like donors or government officials. This can deepen the analysis. It should also identify practical actions for improvement. It can bring conflict to the surface and require skillful facilitation. Decision-makers should ideally commit to responding to findings and suggestions - which can require some flexibility.
  6. Repeat the process. Regularly repeating the process allows changes to be monitored. It can show if operational changes have had results. It can also help to improve the quality of feedback that organisations receive, as farmers develop confidence that their opinions are taken seriously.

Using these practices, organisations can systematically monitor different farmers' satisfaction with: (a) the level of influence - or voice - they have in a programme, and (b) the services and activities being carried out.

As a result, feedback can provide a mechanism for organisations to manage 'farmer voice'. To be effective, it has to be linked to planning, monitoring and revising activities. Farmers should be involved in analysing issues, planning activities and defining success. They should also be involved in reviewing performance and identifying improvements.

Organisations have to respond to what different farmers say, which can mean getting involved in local level negotiations between different groups. Many other factors influence these accountability processes, like donor contracts, transparency and external actors. Following through on farmer voice can involve managing tensions between stakeholders and conflicting priorities.

Ethical issues

Feedback systems raise significant ethical issues. Organisations may talk to people who do not represent the intended respondents' views. Women are particularly likely to be excluded. Farmers' time must be respected and they should be asked for their informed consent before they participate.

Badly implemented, feedback systems can generate misleading data for decision makers and worsen power imbalances among farmers. Keystone's ethical framework for constituent feedback describe the issues - and responses - more fully.

Incentives

Our analysis identified a repeated difficulty in the incentives for using feedback systems. As a sector, we have known how to implement feedback systems for years. But relatively few programmes have used them. Where they have been used, they have sometimes died out.

Various factors appear to discourage managers from implementing feedback systems. They include the volume of work staff face, the costs of implementation, conflicts with other approaches and the way priorities are shaped by donors and senior managers.

Good practice seems to rely on leadership within implementing organisations and donors. Comparative data has changed norms in some sectors, by creating shared reporting standards. We believe a good entry point is to encourage managers to:

"report farmer satisfaction"